Intro to Write With RCS

Write With RCS: An introduction to a writing niche

Here are some little essays on writing. There are a couple of more in the works and ideas for couple of more in mind That seems enough to begin this little niche blog dealing with writing.

Over the years I have had several blogs, but nearly all of them have had a mix of many topics. I have seen and believed that the better blogs nearly always have a discrete topic or niche. So, now I intend to try and have such a blog.

My present suggestion to bloggers, including myself, is to sort and present your writings into clearly defined areas. My first efforts to that end will be this blog on writing. "Writing" may not be enough of a clearly defined area. So, it seems I have a great deal of room for improvement.

This blog will deal with the practice of writing. It may become a "how to" start writing and keep writing and include suggestions for getting "unstuck." It may include a suggestion or two for completing a useful draft. I will probably post of seeing our writing as a process of self-development and growth. The posts here will be about bettering our writing.

It is beginning to sound like a "how to blog." Maybe I should call this blog, Hints For Bettering Our Writing. I say 'our' and mean 'our.' So I will appreciate your comments, suggestions, corrections, and hints for better writing because I need them. There is a "comment" window below where you can write to us. Your commenting can be anonymous, but it is better if you can identify yourself. Of course you an identify yourself with a pen name if you wish.

To start a valuable piece of writing, consider making a problem interesting and follow by offering a useful solution.

Richard C. Sheehan

draft: My Purpose at this Site

Durable Information and Comments

My purpose for this site and for each of the associated sites is to offer you useful, durable information, lasting information which you can use right now or next year. I am a kind of instructor who at this site wants to help you to understand and use helpful information I have. As I get to know you and your wants I make the information more of a "how to do" nature. Your comments help me to do that.

This site has lost its "comments" app, sorry! However, some of the associated sites have been able to keep that. One of those sites is Dialogue With RCS . To use this associated site for comments relate to this site click on the blue title just above.

That will take you directly to the Dialogue With RCS website. There go to the end of any post and click on "comments" or "no comments." A place to post comments will appear. At that comments widow print the name of the site on which you want to comment and the particular post you are commenting. Now you can ask your questions, tell me how I may help, or make a comment.

You may note that this site and all of its associated sites have three columns. central column which contains the essays or posts. The left hand column and right hand column mostly contains ways to search for the information which interests you. The left hand column begins with an app whereat you may select a language congenial for your reading of the posts. In this same column is a list of some of our associated sites.

A Center of Gravity and the Power of Feedback Improves Your Writing

Early thoughts on writing better

We can improve our writing. I have posted a few little essays about that here. We can begin to identify processes whereby we can better our writing. Here is an early post with my attempt to identify such processes.

The following sentences point to ways to improve our writing which may be obvious:

~ Read my posts here.

~ Read for pleasure with some awareness of the writing process.

~ Read about writing.

~ Try to see how your favorite writer wrote.

~ Study under a good writing teacher.

~ Join a writing group.

~ Form a writing group.

~ Start writing.

~ Keep writing.

We can learn by practice. I hope to be learning as I essay this writing. I intend to pass on as much of what in seem to be learning as I can. I have tried to follow all of the suggestions above accept joining a group for writing and forming a writing group.

Participation in a writing group strikes me as being an agreeable and productive activity. I have read about writing groups and there is a special kind of group which I find attractive. A kind of group improved and practiced by a special teacher and writer, an Englishman by the name of Peter Elbow. One of his books is entitled Writing Without Teachers. The following is in large part my interpretation of some of this book.It is an accessible work which offers a variety of help for writers. A secondary title for that book might well be THE POWER OF GOOD FEEDBACK.

There are plenty of books about improving ones writing and some of them are very good, but this one by Mr Elbow is high in my consciousness. I have written more about this special kind of writing group in other essays on this site. I believe that we can learn a lot by helping others better their craft. I suspect that our learning can be better as members of a writing group.

Many find that our writing practice can be part of an important personal growth process. As our writing develops so do we. It seems a good deal As we grow and mature, our writing gets better. as our writing gets better, we grow and mature.

We may not be surprised to find that while while completing a single piece. the writer herself may be surprised that she grows grows and matures with her writing.

My Recent Experience:

I have found that I am now not surprised that I can find a "center of gravity" in a piece of work as I write it. I have found that it may move around as I write. But find it is most often the pleasant process of discovering the sharp short form of what what it is am really writing about.

The list below includes ways, I have gathered from Mr. Elbow, for getting a center of gravity or unifying theme around which I can organize my writing. I am trying to be helpful and this could my way of saying that you have my blessing to stray from your original outline. Even so, discovering your real unifying theme could be more useful than your outline or your original idea.

Okay, here's the list:

~ Starting with X because it seems more believable than Y; note that as you write about X, that you are beginning to understand about Y.

~ Continue your struggle with X and Y and see "A" come up.`

~ As you write along you may honestly say, "Ah, now I see what I have been getting at."

~ Finish what you have been writing about. Put it aside for a time. See useful implications as you look it over again.

~ See that your good idea is crap. Then see that part of the crap looks less crappy. You sort out the good parts from the bad. You do not have to throw anything. Some of it may turn out to be better than your favorite idea.

~ Your first writing may prove a good scaffolding for your next writing.

~ You find a powerful spark in a tiny digression. You keep the same elements of your work, but change the whole orientation for the better.

~ As you progress in your writing, be alert to emerging focus of theme.

~ If nothing emerges, sum up that which you have written, then sum it up again.

~ Push yourself a bit to keep getting some center of gravity or summing up to occur.

~ Work gradually toward moderation of extreme positions.

Don't try to do all of the above at once every time! In fact you may find other ways of doing things excellent for you. For example you may find it better for you to work allout in your mind before beginning to write. I understand that some do so very well. Many of us do something very like the above, turn out good work, and find out that we learn a lot in the process. You may benefit a great deal by rereading the items above and then comparing them to your process. I have found that at times just one of these items can be saver.

Peter is a great teacher and better writer. The entirety of the book I have mentioned is mostly about writing groups and the center of gravity for this book of his could well be The Power of Feedback.

Several of essays on this site deal with writing groups.

Thank you for reading.

You might want to save the address of this site.

RCS

Writing Group

Your writing group is a place to learn from each other to teach one another and to give and receive loving feedback.

Writing Better:

At this blogsite you can find some of my recent thoughts on our good writing and also on the use of a group to that same goal.

Many write for themselves and do not think much about readers. Many want readers and write for readers. So, the way one writes matters. If your writing feel good to you and for you, that is good. All writing benefits from that. Your view and feelings matter. You might not get much feedback from your readers, so you have to depend upon yourself. However, you can benefit greatly from your reading of published authors. You may learn best from the authors you appreciate the most.

Most writers seem to learn most about writing is by reading. Reading the best authors you most appreciate may be your best source of learning. If you really want to learn from them you might want to pay more conscious attention to the way they Write. You may want to analyze their writing. Your most solid way of learning to write is by writing. Later, it is helpful to look at your own writing and the writing of others to better see how it was done. Writers keep writing. Every developing writers seem to do most of the acts some of the time. Everyone does this with their own variations.

Many think about feedback. They would like some positive and specific feedback by people who have abundant experience with reading and writing. Criticism can be very positive and helpful and some experienced writers like it and appreciate, and find it useful. I still do not look for negative criticism. We like to hear people say "I really enjoyed reading that piece of yours." But, it is more useful to hear about the details. We feel the lack of details about how the reader felt as they read a specific page, paragraph, or sentence of ours.

Many writing teachers, even when they are helped by assistants and other students, haven't the time and energy to provide you with in depth feedback for much of the work you turn in.

Enter the Writing Group!

For you and me as serious writers, a writing group can be better than a good teacher. We can learn much from a good teacher, but we seldom get all the good feedback we want and need.

One of the best characteristics of a writing group is the quality of the feedback you can get. Along with that quality you can get from your group, there you may also get more feedback from a variety of interest writers over a longer period of time. From your writing group you have a variety of knowledgeable, and interested individuals tell you how the felt upon reading a specific piece of your work. Often one can have this done more than once a month,

You may attract more than one teacher to be a member of your group. They may need to be reminded that they are not there to teach. They, and each member of your group must focus on telling you about their experience while the read the writing you summited. These readers can tell you of the mood that comes through to them, the characters who come through, and which voices come through most tellingly. They can even tell you that they couldn't pay good attention because they were ill and had not slept well!

On this writing site you can benefit by reading several of the many little essays here and and be nicely surprised by the posting of a new essay. Simply scrolling down you can find other essays. To find many others you can be alert to a place were it says ''older posts" and clicking on that phrase and so encounter other useful essays. This is a site in progress, so new essays are on the way. Not all are about groups, but all are about writing.

Beneficial Actions You Can Take Now:

~ Start writing and keep writing.~

~ Search for an active writing group close enough for your use.

~ Try to sit in on a writing group meeting.

~ Check writing posts here and on other websites.

~ Consider forming a group of your own.

~ Keep writing.

Consider your options. You do not have to have a group to become a good writer. Some great works have been written with pen and paper and a pencil can do well.

When you are beginning a group you may consider asking potential members to consider the following points.

Consideration of the following points can benefit a group and potential members:

~ Find a time to meet and try to stick to it. It's fair to start a second group if there are several who can't attend at the selected time.

~ Help each other to become better better listeners and readers.

~ Consider how works will be presented. For example: Do you want to hand out individual copies to be read later? or Do you want a work to be read aloud couple during a meeting?

~ When you read a short piece for consideration during a class, try reading it twice. You may find a second reading importantly useful.

~ Show up at your meeting.

~ Continue to write.

More to come.

Thank you for reading.

rcs

We Want Feedback

We can live and write for days. weeks, and months without feedback

Even so, one of the top values of a writing group is the variety of great feedback it often provides.

The developing, growing, maturing writer learns to value the feedback of one's peers. Such feedback is precious and very often rare. Your writing group will be made up of fellow writers. In such a group you can have several knowledgeable readers telling you about the feelings and thoughts your writing stirred in them. They can tell you what they felt as they read a specific piece of your work. You can get regular feedback of several kinds from the members of your group.

I hope to post more about feedback and other benefits of a writing group in future posts. This particular post is a short wide-ranging introduction to the subject.

A writing group is usually about writing better without the use of a teacher. However, a writing group may attract more than one teacher, including teachers of writing. Don't be surprised if that happens, teachers are often learners who want to learn more about their subject.

They might, however, need to be reminded that they are not there to teach. They are there as a learning reader and writer. They are there to be good readers ready to provide their honest reactions to that which they read. Each of your group members focus on telling you how she experiences the work you submit. Just as you will tell her how you experience your careful reading of her work.

Quickly moving forward, I here add actions you may consider taking before you choose a writing group or before making one of your own.You can:

~ Start writing and keep writing.

~ Find a writing group in action close to you and check it our.

~ Sit in a a couple of meetings to see how it may benefit or suit you.

~ Check out online posts here and elsewhere about writing and writing groups.

~ Talk with a writing friend about forming a group.

~ Consider that most better writers have been good readers.

Once you better know your options and better know the kind of group you want, you might consider thoughts you would like potential members of your group to consider.

Here are some sample points of the sort:

~ Find a time for your meeting and stick to it. Its fair to have have two writing groups each meeting at a different time.

~ Help one another to become better listeners and better readers as well as better writers.

~ Help each other to better know the kinds of feedback most needed and most wanted.

~ Decide on whether you want to handout your work to be read at home, to read your work aloud at meetings, or both, or what.

~ When you read a piece in group, read it twice. You will find that two readings are much better than one.

~ Show up at meetings.

I enjoy and appreciate your comments about specific parts of the content of my posts. There is, I hope, a "comment" window just below. It may sometimes be marked with the words "no comments!"

RCS

Without a Teacher

Learning to write without a teacher may be effectively done and enjoyed.

It has been done in groups of from 5 to 17 participants. Basically, the members each commit to reading the writing of a member then to coming together with the other members to share their feelings about what they have read.

Hearing what others have felt as they read your works has proven a great help to improving one's writing and a powerful experience in itself.

Any Questions? I'll clarify one doing without being asked.
Every member reads one specified piece of writing of one member of the group. Then in a gathering of all the members each member tells about how she felt as she read the piece. This telling of feelings is done at nearly every meeting of the group.

The bit below is about what I have learned from my experience and from Mr. Elbow. It is something that I might offer at an appropriate moment in the gathering of my group.

On the horizon, a Final Draft

Once you have some writing from which it seems you can coax some coherence, you may be close to the point at which to edit and turn out a final copy.

Take 15 minutes to make your meaning clear to yourself.

You might let yourself consider an outline or plan.

Sum up what you have into a genuine single assertion of what your meaning is. Not easy, but possible. Remember that your assertion must actually assert something that can be quarreled with.

You have grown your meaning and specified it to yourself clearly. Good for you. Your efforts and good thinking will give you a good chance to do some truly powerful writing.

by Richard Sheehan
or Mago Bill

In a Writing Group

Are you serious about having a group?

Tell me about it. I am interested; I may even be able to offer some help, or to try to do so. And remember, you do not have to have one. Many successful writers have never had the experience of a group. Most have received some feedback and many have benefited from that feedback.

The following few paragraphs may help you in your efforts to recruit group members and even help to keep a a group to keep going:

Talk feedback. An important, and appreciated, function of your group can be providing feedback to one another. There are effective ways of doing so. I will try to touch on a couple of those ways here.

Other purposes for your group can include: inspiring you to write, improving the effectiveness of your words, and help you to feel satisfaction in your development. On this blog are an increasing number of posts calculated to improve your chances of pleasing a reader. These posts can help you to continue writing well with or without a group. You are welcome to explore them all.

Back to group feedback:

Selections of members' writing may be read in group, yours too. This can be an important step toward providing useful feedback to a writer. Useful feedback begins with careful reading of her work. Often the entire group will participate in providing feedback on a given selection. I like to hear the selection read aloud to the whole group a couple of times. Group members will volunteer their comments and all are encouraged to do so. Group members will often quickly learn to make their feedback more honest and more helpful with little need for encouragement. Still, it is OK to encourage them.

Writers may find that more reading may move them to better writing.

A writer will appreciate a careful reading of her work. Should the writer be male he is likely to appreciate a careful reading of his work.

Reading:

As a reader don't be nervous in telling how a given selection affected you. Your job can be well done just by honestly saying something about what happened to you as you read her selection. With this you will be making a great beginning and also doing that which will continue to be helpful over time.

Some preparation may be called for. At times a piece may be read to you a couple of times in group. At other times you may take a written copy home to read carefully more than once. Everyone ought to be prepared to give feedback. Everyone will begin to learn a bit about providing feedback useful to the writer. The practice of honesty is a good practice to follow. Honesty can be kind and even loving as well as cutting and brutal. When you are not sure what kind of honesty is best at the time, it is usually best to choose kind and considerate.

Your good reading habits may get even better as you read the works of your fellow writers. You may come to pay better attention to your own feelings during your reading and even remember their occasion. Better reading often results in improved writing.

More about feedback:

Upon hearing or reading a writers work, be ready to tell her how her words led you to react or feel. Tell her what happened to you as you read her words. You can also tell her what you understood or failed to understand from her writing. If the piece bored you, tell her so. Be honest. If you had a cold and had not slept well before your reading, let her know that it may have affected your reaction to her work.

Do your best to complete your assigned reading. You may even suggest that it might be best for you to complete a reading during group time or to listen to a reading during group time. It's your group too. It is still unfair not to read. It is best to aim to read near your best. Read the work a second time and note the difference. Be a good reader to help others to write better and to give yourself a chance to write better. Be a better than average reader even when it feels somewhat burdensome to do so. You can tell the writer that it was burdensome. You can also tell him what you thought he was getting at and what seemed to be his main points. Your honesty can be very helpful.

You can often help a fellow writer by telling him, or her, when and at what point, in your reading you felt perplexed, annoyed, or disappointed, enlightened, pleased and satisfied. Say what made you laugh or smile. Say when you got it and felt pleased. Say when the work felt rewarding.

You now know some of the responsibility of a reader at feedback time.

At that same time the writer's job is to hear the feedback, to be quiet and listen. Then to consider how to use the information to help her, or him, to write to better effect or to continue to practice his or her wonderful ability.

Much of your ability to write well may develop with practice and experience at some distance from both class and group. Still classes have helped many, and group is helping may more, to develop their talent and ability.

Thank you for reading.

Keep writing.

rcs

Writing: Rambling Glimpses of My Development

Words to the Readers of Writing With RCS

We are learning to write well. Writing well is a bit different for each of use. For most of us, writing well includes being understood. I have come to believe that writing is an ongoing developmental process. In that process we often develop as much as our writing does. That development includes growth, maturation, cooking, transformation and like that. It seems to let more meaning and understanding into our lives. All this occurs whether we are aware of it or not. Sooner or later we usually do become aware that the process changes us. That awareness gives us a chance to co-opperate with it.

"Too soon old, too late smart"

I forget who told me that he heard an older immigrant say them. It seems to have caused them both an introspective thought or two. Looking back, I see that I was long mostly unconscious that my writing was developing me perhaps even more than I was developing it. It's a wonderous world, we can, and do improve without being aware of the sources of our growth or its source. I do now see that I was learning and coming to new understandings of my world and of myself. It is a pleasing discovery.

I also discovered that I very often know what I was talking about until I completed writing about it. I hesitate to add that, in an important sense, I have never come to completely come to completely know the nature of "it."

So, in a sense, I have never completed writing anything. Now when I write, I know that I am clarifying my present understanding in a way I hope I can help another to understand. I have more to learn, more to put together. As I practice writing the process of my development is enhanced.

Five Little Steps. Wait for them.......

I have just been looking at some notes of mine and see a little list of five steps. I have found it useful as a way to see where I am in the process of writing a piece. I tells me about my progress. It has been a help and a comfort, but it has not provided me with details of how to write.

Memories:

A lot of memories and thoughts are coming to mind just now, doings and happenings related to writing. A good happening to one wishing to write of writing. I am remembering that I read a lot and still read. I believe that doing so helps me to write. I did not analyze the way a work was written. I just enjoyed the content and tried to understand it. Sometimes I just read as fast as I could so that I could "getto the good parts."

I discovered "vocabulary." I enjoyed my growing vocabulary. It helped me to think better and it helped me, I thought, to better explain my understandings to others. I began to think with my wonderful vocabulary. I believed that, with it, I could make myself understood, not only to myself, but also to others.

I began to use my wonderful vocabulary on my on my friends and my family and to as many more as I could with my writing. I soon found that a few who found my vocabulary gratifying, but they were very few! Many, I discovered, did not know what in the world I was talking about. I was not very aware that meanings could be expressed in a variety of ways, some more appropriate to the moment than were others.

About this time I became a young traveler and writer of letters.I wrote mostly to my mother and my sister and used some of my wonderful vocabulary. They wrote back telling me that they loved my writing and my letters and that they laughed and laughed. I was pleased that they enjoyed my humor, but I thought that they were missing some of my descriptions of scenes I had enjoyed. Had my descriptions been boring. No, I had used my wonderful vocabulary to paint realistic pictures and to include the mood which they had evoked.

As I remember, I was told that the joy of these ladies of my family included rolling on the floor holding their sides from so much laughter. Their laughter, they explained, came from the nature of my very poor spelling, and from their efforts to pronounce my written version of the English language.

I knew my spelling was not wonderful in any positive sense. There were reasons for the poor quality which did not include sloth,, much sloth. I had learned to read with no conscious knowledge of paragraphs, sentences, words or letters. No alphabet for me. I was read to at an early age and had opportunity to look at that which was being read, sometimes being indicated by a moving finger. Slowly I came to recognize words and their meaning and to gain some concept of sentences. I was even slower to recognize individual letters and their significance.

So I was recognizing meaning in writing before I understand the nature of individual words or letters. I did come to see that certain groupings had certain meanings and even certain ways to be said. I was nearly an adult before I recognized that letters in words had much to do with the way they were pronounced. To this day it is difficult for me to attend to letters and their ordering in words.

The idea is that I came to reading with little understanding of letters, words, or their "sounding out." I thank the developers of "spell check." My knowledge of reading contributed less than usual to my ability to spell. I neglected letters. I was not conscious of being bothered by this until I began to receive bad marks on spelling tests in the 3rd grade. Than I thought I was born a bad speller and might benefit from writing the same word over and over again.

The fact that there was not yet a kindergarten in the public school system, that I never entered first grade, and that I entered 2nd grade twice, and entered 3rd grade with never having completed second grade very likely contributed to my condition.

Beginning to write:

Forward to my days of writing. As I struggled with my spelling and wonderful vocabulary, became willing to make my writing more accessible to readers. I did not truly realize that my writing, and even a bit of my speech, had become what might be called academic and literary. What I did was to invent am imaginary brother whom I loved and respected, but who did to enjoy or even appreciate my vocabulary, and perhaps my sometime large jumps in logic. This invented person with whom I very much want to share the thoughts and meanings of my writings. I had much to share with him, much of which it was not easy for me to express.

I decided to use language which I was more sure that we held in common. And, also to try to write so as t be more careful to fill in all the gaps or neglected steps in my logic. (I wish I had a doctor who had the same idea.) I had much to learn, but it was an improvement in my writing. However, half a centaury later, I am still slowly learning to express a fuller meaning of that which I want to say in a language that would be clear to a reader, and to me too. I am still finding that my writing, my writing practice is helping me to have the meaning I want to express more clearly in my mind.

Internet readers:

The internet is a problem for me because I have been unable to get to know my readers. It has been impossible for me to imagine them accurately. Still imagining helps a bit. Feedback helps. Years ago, when I had many more readers world wide. Most of them were from the US, followed by Europe. I began to receive many comments from Eastern Europe and began to get a better concept of to whom I was writing and the nature of their interests. That knowledge and feedback helped me to write better. Then I traveled for a time and finally decided to move from the US to Colombia and from my lack of publishing I lost a great many followers. I began to get a few returning and a few new followers, and along came "Covid 19" and I lost more readers. Also it now seems that a smaller percentage of those using the www know the advantages of blogsites and I do not appreciate the present value of visuals, the I do us a number videos. So now I am down to the number of viewers I had in the 1970s and have practically no commenters so practically no feedback.

Feedback from many blog type webesites is a two way deal or more.

Back to the notes I was looking at:

The list had been a sort of aid to where I was in the process in a given piece of writing. The process is divided into five parts. You may find it useful as some others have.

Here are these five steps:

1. Start writing and keep writing(its OK to stop to eat, sleep, and cogitate). Having the idea in the back of one's mind of completing the piece at hand may be helpful.

2. Experience disorientation and chaos, and keep writing. Here too it may be useful to have near consciousness the orientation and order may return.

3. Begin to detect to detect a growing center of gravity, the development of a central theme. Continue to continue to develop and express that central theme as you continue to write.

4. Mop up. Make sure that you have written you you thought you wrote.

5. Edit for publishing.

You may very well see other steps to include. I find that I may do two rewrites with rests in between, followed by another clean up.

Writing is an ongoing practice. Continued practice with these steps in mind has improved the writing process of others. They also can help one to be alert to where they are and what they are doing in the process of their writing.

Early on the second step seem to come to me most naturally. I often pass through it quickly these days, but it still recurs and is help in sorting through what's on your mind. I think about and develop my writing as I write. I find that it is a learning process for me.

We writers have a ''hard row to hoe." That is to say writing is seldom easy. We not only feel compelled to think about meaning and understanding, but also topic, theme, outline, paragraph, spelling, readers, etc, etc.

I have learned, am learning, and I am grateful. I hope to share more with you. Looking over that which I have written here, I do not see it as complete.

I see it as probably enough for now. The center of gravity may be weak. With another look it may seem half cooked. Right now I can see it as a fair beginning. I expect to continue the practice of writing and to keep plenty of meaning in my life. I may also experience an ongoing gratitude for my spell check app.

Thanks for reading. Come back anytime; the sooner the better.

rcs